CHAPTER ONE

1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 IMPORTANCE OF HIGHWAYS
Transport has always been one of the main factors in the
spread of the civilization. In this age of space exploration and
automation the provision of an efficient and properly
transportation system is nonetheless vital of all stage of
national
and
international
development.
A
highway
development program starts with a chain reaction atomic
nature. It opens up new avenues or increases employment in
agriculture, industry, health and sanitation by inherent virtue of
being a communication and transport between the
development areas.
Before attacking design, it is necessary to establish the
classification of the highway, because the classification will
indicate the order and magnitude of nearly every factor utilized
in the design. The classification of highways into different
operational systems, functional classes, or geometric types, is
necessary for communication among engineers, administrators,
and general public. Different classification schemes have been
applied for different purposes in different rural and urban
regions.
1.2 HIGHWAY GEOMATREIC DESIGNC
Highway geometric design refers to the calculations and
analyses made by transportation engineers (or designers) to fit
the highway to the topography of the site while meeting the
safety, service and performance standards. It mainly concerns
with the elements of the highways that are visible to the
drivers and users. However, the engineer must also take into
consideration the social and environmental impacts of the
highway geometry on the surrounding facilities. Usually,
highway geometric design has the following objectives:
1. Determine, within the allowance permitted by the design
standard and right-of-way, the routing of proposed highway.
2. Incorporate, within the design standard, various physical
features of the road alignment to ensure that drivers have
sufficient view of the road (and obstacles) ahead for them

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to adjust their speed of travel to maintain safety and ride

quality.
3. Provide a basis for the highway engineers to evaluate and
plan for the construction of a section of the proposed
highway.

In the United States, the American Association of State

Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) has published a
series of standards and guidelines
for highway geometric
1
design. The content of chapter three is mainly based on the
latest design policy (AASHTO).
To meet the objective of fitting the highway to site
topography and yet satisfy the safety, service and performance
standards, the following considerations have to be properly
addressed in the design process.
o Design speed
o Design traffic volume
o Number of lanes
o Level of service (LOS)
o Sight distance
o Alignment, super-elevation and grades
o Cross section
o Lane width
o Horizontal and vertical clearance
The above factors are interactive as drivers react to the
combination of them (and among themselves) to produce the
observable operational performance of the highway.
1.3 COMPUTER AIDED HIGHWAY DESIGN
One of the most challenging aspects of an engineering
career, including highway engineering, is trying to keep up with
the "state of the art". One of the major changes in this state of
the art is the use of computer in the highway design process.
The "computer revolution" has come to the point where the
typical day of a highway engineer usually includes some work
on a computer.
Historically, these to be carried out first with the aid of slide
rule, then a calculating machine, and finally with computer.
However, beginning in the late 1950s, as computer began to

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become more widely available, highway designers grasped the

opportunity to use the new technology to perform the more
tedious aspects of their work more quickly and more
accurately, as well as automatically.
The digital computer is one of the most important tools of
the modern highway engineer. It is possible to design manually,
then it is equally possible to create a computer aided design
tool which will produce much accurate results in a fraction of
the time with different alternates and precise result. The most
common application of computers to highway engineering is for
performing the calculation associated with the design of
highway projects. Computers are being used increasingly to
assist highway engineers in work which is laborious and time
consuming.
Geometric problem occur every frequently in the highway
field, common example including survey calculation, horizontal
and vertical alignments, sight distance, right of way, curve and
spiral, superelevations, widening of curves, earthwork and
volume calculations. All such geometric problems can be
handled with great efficiency by the computer. Programs for
horizontal and vertical alignment calculations and earthwork
quantities were developed by various countries during early
1960s.
1.4 OBJECTIVE AND SCOPE OF THE STUDY
A comprehensive computer program was prepared on
the "geometric design of high way by land development" which
contains the following sub programs:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Land Desktop program

Land Desktop complete program
Civil Design program
Survey program
Map program

However, preparing computer programs for geometric

design of highways is very important for highway engineer.

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The study has presented all the information chapter wise as

bellow:
INTRODUCTION, LITERTURE REVIEW, GEOMETRIC DESIGN IN
GENERAL, COMPUTER PROGRAM FOR HIGHWAY GEOMETERIC
DESIGN, DESCRIPTION OF THE PROGRAM, DATA REQUIRED,
AND RESULTS, DESCUSSION OF THE RESULTS, CONCLUTIONS,
AND RECOMMENDATIONS,